


Whatever Remains

by AxeMeAboutAxinomancy



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Grief/Mourning, Hope, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Post Reichenbach, Sad John, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-29
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-12-09 22:17:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/778595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AxeMeAboutAxinomancy/pseuds/AxeMeAboutAxinomancy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the fall, John grieves for Sherlock, and has an epiphany. Two epiphanies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whatever Remains

"I love you," he says.

It's meaningless in an empty room. Worse.

He tries again. If nothing else, he has always meant well.

"I loved you."

That's a little better, but still makes him want to be dead and to never have said it. Or even thought of saying it.

"I loved you so much. Why was I so stupid about it?"

After leaving the grave he goes and gets drunk with Mrs Hudson. Of all people. But who else? Who else loved... him? Molly, maybe?

Maybe. But for now, Mrs. Hudson, and her sad efforts to comfort, and his sad efforts to seem okay. Until the alcohol is one drop past the tipping point and he can pour it all out in tears.

He drinks and drinks in a vain effort to replenish the moisture. Of course with what he's drinking he only makes it worse; he knows that very well; but he is both living and dying both at once all the time and drinking is all there is to give it any structure.

He always thought less of his sister for this weakness, but in the end he's exactly the same. Worse, really. At least she is honest. About the drinking. About where her heart lies. About - everything.

Molly is here after all now. Molly and Mrs. Hudson and him, and they go upstairs to B because, as Mrs H says, there's more room. There is a new bottle of wine, Molly apparently brought it, and a new sour taste in his mouth as more alcohol goes down to join what's already in him.

"He liked you," he finds himself saying to Molly. She is trying to contradict him but she isn't listening and he must explain. "No. No, I mean. He really liked you - not I mean - not the way you wanted. But he _apologised_ to you. After all the awful things he said at the Christmas party. He really - he really - " He is losing his thread. He must not lose his thread now. "He really, Molly, he really - was sorry and I could hardly believe it. I was - right there. He was nicer to you than he ever was to me. You deserved it. You did. He was such a _beast_."

"John - maybe you should - "

"No! Please. I know you want me to - go to bed - sleep off - Jesus I'll never sleep this off. Please just let me. I'll pass out sooner or later... what does it matter."

Crying. Eyes hot and sore. Sleeves wet.

Mrs. Hudson says, "Who's for coffee?" in an effort to be bright and cheery and John gets up to hug her.

"Thank you Mrs. Hudson."

"Oh," and she starts to cry, and he feels terrible, he has made her cry too, and he tries patting her back.

"I'm sorry. I meant to say before - he loved you, I saw it, he was nicer to you than he even was to Molly, like a mother," and he can't go on, blubbing like a child, he sits right down there in the kitchen and puts his arms over his head.

He's never been so drunk in his life. And yet he is never sick, nor hungover afterward. He wallows in the depths of despair and there's no coming out, no matter what he does, no purging it. He has to feel this way until he dies, because Sherlock is dead.

Eventually the two women leave him alone, and he stumbles to the master bedroom. Sherlock's. His own is up another flight of stairs and who cares anymore, who is here to see him stagger against the bed and sag down, helpless, across sheets that hold nothing of their owner's scent.

It's not their fault. Sherlock hardly ever slept in here, hardly ever slept. Sleep was boring, dreams were boring, having a body at all was boring, was he happy now he'd thrown his down?

There's a gun upstairs, whispers a little voice in his head.

There's a gun, upstairs, in his bedside drawer. But since Sherlock died John's been sleeping here, and the gun is a whole flight of stairs away. Too much trouble, for now.

"WHY ARE YOU GONE, WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU," he shouts at the ceiling. "COME BACK AND PLAY YOUR STUPID FUCKING VIOLIN," but shouting doesn't keep the sound of it out of John's head, the sound of Sherlock's voice telling John _I am a fraud I faked it all to impress you watch me die now_

_keep your eyes on me and watch me die_

That's not what he said but it's exactly what he meant and oh - jesus -

_wasn't it bad enough to lose you_

_wasn't it bad enough you killed yourself_

_but you had to do it right in front of me_

_you did it right in front of me_

_by the time I got to your side_

_you lay there broken and staring in the blood_

_saw your eyes ice blue open unfocused_

_felt no pulse_

_god no_

No.

"YOU WERE NOT A FRAUD," with his hands over his eyes, "I'll never believe that, never, never." It is not possible. John lived with him, was with him nearly all the time, and he saw it again and again, saw it happen. Those eyes would laser in and flicker across their target and then the miracles would start. From the first day, the very first day. And the code he deciphered for Irene Adler. In three seconds.

"You were _amazing_."

Sherlock always liked hearing himself admired. And it was so easy to give - But he couldn't hear it now.

John falls asleep curled into a knot in the center of the bed. It's like falling into the bottom of a well. Like trying to fall back into the womb. And failing.

But when he wakes up everything is different. When he wakes up, many hours later, feeling dry and bruised and awful everywhere, before he even opens his eyes a phrase floats through John's mind and he catches at it to stop himself drowning. Sherlock's voice.

_It's a magic trick._

Slowly, John sits up.

 _No,_ says his brain, stubborn, _I saw, I felt, I was there -_

And supplies him, not helpfully, with the images again. Pale eyes open, staring at nothing. Blood, so much precious blood pooling out from his head, dark curls sodden with it. Nothing in the wrist, nothing.

Why did he want John to stand in that one exact place?

_Stay right there. Keep your eyes fixed on me._

_It's a trick, a magic trick._

Not past tense, it _was_ a trick. Present tense, it _is_ one.

After this, it isn't the same. After this there's a flicker of hope inside him and he thinks it over, again and again, the things that were strange that day.

There were strange things. There were.

Making him stand in one place. Controlling his perspective.

Making him be the note. Like he was a bit of paper to scribble a message on.

The bicycle courier that knocked him down just as he was trying to reach Sherlock. The _timing_ of it. How long did John lie on the ground before he could get up again?

The people all around... the body. Were they all from Bart's? Hadn't some of them been... odd? That isn't sure. He was disoriented then, time dilating into horror.

And there was one more thing. One more thing, but it's weeks before he can remember it. It was such a tiny detail. Such a strange little thing. He saw it at the time, noticed it was weird, but so much else had been happening and it was so small.

The blue stress ball. Sherlock playing with it, bouncing it off the wall.

Sherlock didn't _do_ idle things with his hands. He put his palms together. He didn't _play_ with pens, cups, paper clips, anything! But... how could it possibly be important?

John doesn't know.

But it's a magic trick.

The people John knows are bothered by his attitude. He knows that. They expect him to be sadder. They expect him to be angrier. Molly looks particularly worried. He is sad and angry both but he knows what he knows. There are questions. There are doubts. He has room to breathe within these. There is a middle way, a balancing point, a strange calm place to wait.

It is impossible that Sherlock should no longer exist. With that impossibility eliminated, what remains? Nothing but hope.

But hope will have to do, till Sherlock comes home.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this last year, and forgot about it. Now that the third series is in production, I can't stop thinking about the reunion scene. I bet there will be punching rather than canonical fainting.


End file.
